


xxviii. unfortunate targets of crime

by tempestaurora



Series: the kids aren't alright [whumptober 2020] [28]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Fluff, Gen, John Mulaney References I'm Sorry, Mugging, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Whumptober, World is Saved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-28
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:49:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27245269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tempestaurora/pseuds/tempestaurora
Summary: Imagine mugging Diego Hargreeves. Diego “Number 2” “The Kraken” Hargreeves. Or, legally, Number Two “Diego” “The Kraken” Hargreeves. Just imagine it. Imagine having the gall. The balls. The nerve. The sheeraudacityto see a man covered in knives and think,Ah, yes, that’s my target.OR: the seven umbrella academy kids and their experiences getting mugged
Relationships: Allison & Ben & Diego & Number Five | The Boy & Klaus & Luther & Vanya, Diego Hargreeves/Eudora Patch
Series: the kids aren't alright [whumptober 2020] [28]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1930186
Comments: 52
Kudos: 223





	xxviii. unfortunate targets of crime

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DeadlyJellybaby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeadlyJellybaby/gifts), [Peachykeenaspie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peachykeenaspie/gifts), [TheMutantHonk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMutantHonk/gifts), [sionnachsSkulk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sionnachsSkulk/gifts).



> Prompt: Mugged
> 
> yes i changed the official title because the official title was dumb lmao like fuck that
> 
> we're so! close! to the end! i can TASTE my freedom.
> 
> gifted to: DeadlyJellyBaby for wanting diego getting mugged pre-canon, feat. eudora; likewise Peachykeenaspie and TheMutantHonk; and sionnachsSkulk for wanting SUPERSTAR ALLISON HARGREEVES (and the others) to get mugged because imagine that lmao

ONE

The day Luther Hargreeves got mugged, he was just minding his own business. The world was long saved and he was coming off a ten-hour shift at the fire house. He was bone-tired and walking home – the house wasn’t far from the mansion, and he liked the city at sunset, the sky all pink and orange – a duffle slung over one shoulder, when he decided to take the shortcut down the side of the mansion, to the back door that led into the kitchen.

He was half way down the alley when four guys with knives decided to give him trouble.

“You got _mugged?_ ” Klaus scoffed when he told them about it ten minutes later.

“I got _almost mugged_ ,” Luther corrected. “You really think I’d let them win?”

Vanya, who was staring over a pot of something bubbling at the stove, said absently, “Did you do Street Smarts?”

“What?”

She blinked and looked over. “You know. You get a money clip. You put a hundred dollars in the money clip. When someone tries to mug you, you _throw_ the money clip one way and run the other— _street smarts!_ ”

Luther stared. “Are you wasting a hundred dollars every time you get mugged?”

Klaus cackled in his chair, feet up on the table, and Vanya rolled her eyes.

“You have powers now, Vanya,” Luther said. “You don’t have to get mugged anymore.”

“You say that like it’s a past time,” Allison pointed out as she fetched the plates from the shelf. “And she’s quoting a comedian. It’s not—she doesn’t have a money clip. She’s not telling you to get one.”

“What’d you do to them, anyway?” Diego asked, as Luther had expected he might.

“Kicked their asses and sent them on their way with a stern lecture and a free smoke alarm,” he replied with a shrug.

Klaus laughed and Diego shook his head.

“You just carry those around?” he asked.

Luther shrugged. “I was gonna replace the ones here – but if they’re robbing a guy who carries no more than ten dollars and a Nokia brick phone with him, they might need them more.”

TWO

Imagine mugging Diego Hargreeves. Diego “Number 2” “The Kraken” Hargreeves. Or, legally, Number Two “Diego” “The Kraken” Hargreeves. Just imagine it. Imagine having the gall. The balls. The nerve. The sheer _audacity_ to see a man covered in knives and think, _Ah, yes, that’s my target._

Diego couldn’t even respect the courage of the two men in the night. He couldn’t get past their overwhelming stupidity.

He left them in a heap on the floor, bloody and broken and bruised, and called Eudora as he wandered away.

“What?” she huffed on answering. “I’m at work, Diego.”

“I just got _mugged,_ ” he replied, going for incredulity.

“You what? Are you okay?”

“Oh, I’m fine. They didn’t get a hit on me—they, however…”

He heard her sigh. Diego didn’t want to think that they were on their way out; they were just going through a rough patch. He had been let go from the academy and she—Eudora Patch had the fastest transfer to detective in NYPD history. She’d managed to get a fast track and taken it, hauling her good-for-nothing boyfriend along with her.

Diego was a vigilante and in the day time he bussed tables or tended bar – wherever had free shifts. He was a dead weight right now, but he wouldn’t always be. One day, he’d rise up and be the guy Eudora met, and vigilantism was his path there. Back to saving the world. Back to being a _hero._

Eudora had to see that as much as he did.

But currently, she was tense and short around him, and now must be massaging her temples at her desk.

“So, you’re okay.”

“I’m okay. They’re not. They might need a hospital.”

“Then call an ambulance.”

He shrugged. She couldn’t see it. He said, “I think they work for that new crime ring downtown.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Found that symbol from your file on the coffee table—”

“You shouldn’t be looking in that.”

“You shouldn’t be taking the files home,” Diego shot back. “But you did, and I snooped, and I’m telling you, these guys work for them.”

He heard her deep sigh. She would be toying between telling him to just call 9-1-1 and report the attack, or taking him as an anonymous source and running with it. She chose the latter.

“I’ll get a squad car down there,” she said. “I want you gone by the time they get there.”

“No problem.”

“Don’t look in my files again.”

“Don’t leave them on the coffee table.”

“Diego.”

“Eudora.”

“Leave it to me, alright? I don’t want to see you involved in this case again.” She hung up before he could protest.

Diego considered it, then shrugged. He knew what the symbol looked like _and_ the bar that might be housing the worst of the ring. Eudora would thank him later for doing the work for her – for going where a cop couldn’t go.

He started off downtown.

THREE

“In recent news,” the talkshow host said, “you got _mugged_ recently?”

Allison laughed. “Attempted mugging. They didn’t get anything and, actually, they left with less than they arrived with.”

The host raised her eyebrows in mock incredulity. She already knew the story. “So, what happened?”

“I was just walking in L.A. at night—”

“First mistake.”

“Oh, you bet. I was picking up dinner from this really cute little noodle bar Patrick and I like to order from, and I was just leaving when this guy with a gun grabbed me and pulled me into an alley.”

“Oh, my god.”

“Yeah! But I always find that kind of thing funny—”

“ _Funny?_ ”

“They never know who they’re dealing with!” Allison laughed with the audience.

“So you pulled out the good old Rumour?”

“Oh, no, I don’t really do that anymore. I stopped him the old-fashioned way.”

“Yelling _Fire?_ ”

“Kicked his ass, actually.” The audience laughed and clapped and Allison kept a smile on her face, even though the truth of the matter was a lot darker than they’d ever know. The Umbrella Academy was a novelty these days, at least in terms of Allison’s career. A cute little interview topic to pull out and get a neatly packaged answer for those die-hard fans to salivate over.

_Oh, we all trained together every afternoon._

_Klaus once broke his jaw because he missed being centre of attention._

_Five once got jealous of Vanya getting to learn an instrument, so he tried to learn harmonica for all of two weeks before it got on Dad’s nerves._

The audience couldn’t handle the truth, though.

_We trained until our feet were bleeding and we were vomiting in the bathtub._

_Klaus didn’t fall down the stairs and break his jaw; he was pushed._

_Five’s harmonica was broken into pieces and he was upset for weeks, because it had let him finally have something in common to do with Vanya._

She laid out half-truths and let them take what they wanted. She would not tell them that she beat the mugger bloody; that her knuckles were bruised for weeks. That she hadn’t fought like this in a long time; fought to hurt, to break – and she revelled in the taste of the violence she was raised on. She didn’t tell a soul that she went too far, and the man stopped breathing, and she had to start CPR and sob down the phone to 9-1-1 to get an ambulance, and then race away before they showed up, so they’d never know it was her.

She’d keep that secret close to her chest and she’d die with it there.

FOUR

Klaus got mugged semi-regularly.

Occasionally, Klaus mugged others. Not at gunpoint or anything. Perhaps it was more like robbing. General, non-violent burglary.

Once, he was totally stealing from a guy in a darkened alley when Diego showed up, all vigilante-Batman-in-the-night, and Klaus pretended he was the one being mugged. He let Diego beat up the other guy, who happened to have a weapon on him to bolster Klaus’ story, and then drive him to Griddy’s for donuts and back to the apartment with the futon he was crashing on.

Sometimes, shit just happened on the streets.

Ben always lectured him on it, but no one else would ever know. Just Klaus and his brother. It was remarkably easy to keep secrets when one of the people was dead.

FIVE

Best wishes to the poor motherfucker that tried to mug Five. He didn’t call 9-1-1 when he left their body in the alley, but then again, did they deserve it? When they’d just tried to mug what seemed to be a thirteen-year-old _child?_

Five washed the blood off his hands when he got home, and sent a smarmy grin to Klaus when he asked what happened.

“You ever been mugged?” he asked.

Klaus pulled a face, which Five recognised as being the one he made right before he told a lie. “Crime and I don’t pass each other often,” he said, and yeah, that was a blatant lie if Five ever heard one.

He didn’t care though, because as far as Five was concerned, his brother was eating regularly and had a bed to sleep in. He could tell as many lies as he wanted.

“Did _you_ just get mugged?” Klaus questioned, leaning on the bathroom doorframe.

“Obviously not.” Klaus raised an eyebrow. “It’s not a mugging if someone says _give me your wallet, kid_ and then is violently and brutally attacked.”

Klaus tipped his head to the side. “You really are feral, huh?”

Five’s smile was like a knife’s edge. “It’s a gift.”

SIX

Ben Hargreeves was never once mugged in his life. Nor did he ever mug anyone.

Ben Hargreeves did however give excellent, well-thought out lectures to Klaus whenever _he_ mugged or got mugged by someone. Klaus just didn’t appreciate them, was all.

SEVEN

Vanya was headed back to the mansion from rehearsal when she got mugged in the alley down the side of the house. She sighed deeply as the four guys surrounded her with guns and knives.

“Are you the same guys that attacked Luther the other day?” She looked around them, holding the strap of her violin case tight. “Do you want another free smoke alarm? He has a lot of them. He’s _very_ safety-conscious about fires these days.”

One of the men swore her out in a manner most indelicate and demanded she hand over her stuff. Vanya huffed, then centred herself. She reached out to the constant roll of traffic and felt it convert inside her into power.

A minute later, she was walking through the door into the kitchen.

“I just got mugged!” she announced to the room, which for once consisted of all her siblings at once, apparently about to sit down for dinner.

“You _what?_ ” Allison asked.

“Are you okay?” Klaus questioned.

“Are the assholes who did this nearby?” Diego demanded. He stood, scraping his chair back.

“They’re out in the alley. I offered them another smoke alarm but I don’t think they really cared for the first one.”

Luther frowned.

“Did you throw your money clip?” Klaus asked after a second.

“The one with the hundred dollars in it,” Allison clarified.

“You can’t let them take you to a second location,” Diego said with a firm nod.

Vanya dumped her violin on the ground, rolling her eyes.

“Ah,” Five said from the head of the table. “Street smarts.”

Luther blinked at him. “You saw that comedian too?”

Five shrugged. “Everyone in the _world_ saw that comedian, Luther. Even me, and I was in the _apocalypse._ Where were you?”

Luther sighed, flopping back in his chair. “It’s not my fault,” he said. “The moon doesn’t get good wifi.”

**Author's Note:**

> i will die on the hill that luther hargreeves deserves to be a firefighter. also i'm sorry about the john mulaney reference i couldn't help myself.
> 
> pls talk to me in the comments i need encouragement
> 
> also: *small boy from the early 1910s voice* EXTRA EXTRA: FIC WRITER IN NEED OF OUTSOURCING IDEAS FOR THEIR FUTURE CONTENT. WILL GIFT FIC TO WHOEVER INSPIRES IT
> 
> yikes that was embarrassing of me but i can't be bothered to delete it. here are the prompts, go buck wild pls: "day 30: now where did that come from?" prompts: "wound reveal, ignoring an injury, internal organ injury"


End file.
